Taxing Health Benefits 15 March 2009
Posted by Lao Tzu in economy, medicine, politics.Tags: taxes, taxing health benefits
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Many in this country have been against the idea of public health care. The idea of our tax money going to provide health care to the population was repugnant to most. As our children attend public schools and we drive on public roads, the idea of ensuring (with an e) that every citizen had access to health care (diagoses, medicine, treatment) was just too much for some. I never understood their rationale, myself.
Interestingly, the white house has recently stated that it would consider the idea of taxing our health benefits (full story) in order to raise money to help pay for the new health care plan. I assume that is because we are broke from bailing out the banks.
For those that don’t see the irony here, let me break it down. Our free enterprise system implies that we pay for our own health care. But it is too expensive, so we get some assistance from insurance companies. But they end up being too expensive, so we get help from our employers where they pay an ever decreasing portion of the cost of the insurance. All of a sudden, someone sees that as an opportunity to extract more taxes from either you or your employer. So this means that instead of you paying taxes to get free health care, you pay for health care, and you pay taxes for any assitance you get to pay for your health care. Just the opposite of socialized medicine.
What’s worse is that our Government is just blatantly making up new taxes without justification in order to pay for the bailout. When I say ‘justification’, I refer to the fact that a tax must serve some purpose against the thing being taxed, not soley for the sake of bringing in revenue. If this is allowed, there is no theoretical end to this scope.
But the funniest part of this story is where it states, “Those who want to tax benefits in whole or in part make two main arguments. They say the tax exclusion is a generous subsidy that insulates employees from the true costs of health care, …”
I thought that was the whole point of insurance.
And The Loudest Voice Wins Again 17 June 2008
Posted by Lao Tzu in media, medicine, sociology.Tags: ama, cherry picking, childbirth, media, ricki lake
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There was a shining example in the news today of a critical problem plaguing America – idiots with microphones. To elaborate, there has been a trend for about 20 years now where the general population can’t separate fame from power and thereby assumes anyone famous (for whatever reason) has something important or intelligent to say (e.g., celebrities on the Bill Maher show, the political speeches at the Oscars, etc.). It’s not their fault. It is an inate psychological mechanism that causes us to assume that if someone is famous, they must be great. Unfortunately, today it just means they get a lot of camera or microphone time (e.g., Oprah, Paris Hilton, etc). The downside of this is that they are constantly either asked their opnion, or their unsolicited opinion is cast about the media like a thunderstorm, no matter how ridiculously stupid.
The latest shining example to which I speak is the recent media focus on Ricki Lake. Apparently, she made a documentary, “The Business of Being Born”, where whe implies something to the effect that giving birth at home might be a preferred option in general, and that giving birth at a hospital is unneccesary and religious doctrine imposed upon us by the AMA. Please read the story, I might be mis-paraphrasing.
The list of logical fallacies in her statement and philosophy are extensive, but for the sake of brevity, let’s hit the biggest one – cherry picking. She has given birth to two (2) children, and everything went smoothly. She was very lucky. To assume that all child births occur in such a manner is silly. The reason people give birth at a hospital with physicians is in case something goes wrong! Basic EMT courses teach that normal childbirth is a natural process and not a medical emergency. It is for the unfortunate anomalies where we realize the benefits of our current medical technologies – that still, unfortunately, aren’t prepared for every scenario.
Will someone please kindly ask these people to stop giving advice. But don’t take my word for it – I am just another idot with a media outlet.
